Vaginal devices for delivering a drug to a vagina are known to the prior art. For example U.S. Pat. No. 196,979 issued to patentee R. H. Kline discloses medicated-ring device consisting of 2 a fabric filled with a medicinal agent useful for treating vaginal diseases. In Gordon W. Duncan U.S. Pat. No. 3,545,439 there is disclosed an intravaginal ring-shaped device that can be made of various kinds of polymeric materials. The device is formed of a solid polymer containing drug that is released by diffusion to the vagina. The device optionally contains a tension spring for keeping it in the vagina. In Theodore J. Roseman U.S. Pat. No. 3,920,805 discloses a solid polymeric device that has a non-medicated central solid core and an encircling medicated coating on the polymer. The device releases drug by diffusion and, in a preferred embodiment, the device is ring-shaped with a flat tensioning spring molded in the non-medicated central core. A vaginal medicament dispensing means is disclosed by James Lee Drobish and Thomas William Gougeon in U.S. Pat. No. 3,991,760. The device in this patent consists of a plurality of containers having walls releasably containing an active agent and connected by a fin arrangement. A vaginal medicament dispensing device is disclosed in Thomas W. Gougeon. U.S. Pat. No. 3,995,633 . The device is characterized by a plurality of containers held in place by a retaining ring by virtue of their bulbous shape. Gisela Schopflen et al. U.S. Pat. No. 4,012,496 issued to discloses a vaginal ring consisting essentially of a supporting medicament-free vaginal ring having an encircling indentation with a smaller vaginal medicament containing a ring in the indentation. Gisela Schopflin et al U.S. Pat. No. 4,155,991 is similar to U.S. Pat. No. 4,012,496 reciting the structure and, additionally, the polymer used for making the vaginal ring. A vaginal contraceptive system is described in Patrick S.-L. Wong. U.S. Pat. No. 4,215,691 The vaginal system comprises a wall surrounding a reservoir housing a drug and a carrier and made of a copolymer. U.S. Pat. No. 4,292,964 issued to Harold A. Nash et al discloses an intravaginal ring consisting essentially of an inner core, a medicated layer encircling the inner core, and an outer layer surrounding the medicated layer. In Patrick S.-L. Wong U.S. Pat. No. 4,286,587 discloses a vaginal device comprising a delivery module with an internal reservoir housing a drug for controlled release to a vagina.
The vaginal devices described above are useful for their intended purposes and they represent a valuable contribution to the vaginal dispensing art. Now it has been discovered a vaginal dispenser can be provided that is easy to manufacture, can be made with materials that are vaginally acceptable and can be used for dispensing drug to the vagina over time. The present invention provides an improvement by making available a vaginal dispenser manufactured as a closed dispenser from the materials comprising the vaginal dispenser. The present invention pertains also to a method for dispensing at least one beneficial agent in the vagina to produce an intended beneficial therapeutic result. The method of the invention provides beneficial agent delivery patterns such as continuous, interrupted, cyclical, sequential, and the like.